GRAND SCENERY. 93 
me a cup of his cold flour gruel to taste, which was a great 
curiosity to me.. It tasted like mush, and was very palatable 
and cooling. 
We caught several horned frogs, a species of lizard, very 
nimble and curious little creatures, quite harmless, and long- 
lived, even when deprived of food, one having been —— six 
months unfed. 
In this way the day passed pleasantly and quickly, and 
_ sunset found us all ready to enter the timber. 
The road from our camp ascended gradually over the 
prairie* for about a mile, when suddenly and abruptly we 
found ourselyes upon the brink of a steep and precipitous 
descent. On either side large grassy bluffs stood like 
fortifications, terrace and bastion rising one over the other, 
as if to guard the entrance. Below, stretching as far as the 
eye could reach, lay the apparently interminable forest of 
the Cross Timbers, like a barrier, on passing which we were 
to be shut out from civilization, its joys and cares, for many, 
many weeks. 
We all stopped involuntarily to cast a last lingering look 
North, where lay all that we held most dear, and home, 
sweet home, never sounded more sadly sweet than when 
sung at that hour, with the last rays of a summer sunset 
deepening the shadows of the battlemented mounds and 
darkening the thick foliage at our feet. One look more, 
‘one sigh, one heartfelt prayer to Heaven that we might be 
ee 
ye 
